Northrop Grumman bags NASA contract to maintain Webb telescope operations

NASA has awarded California-based Northrop Grumman Systems Corporation a multi-year contract to monitor and maintain the James Webb Space Telescope's operations, the agency announced on Friday.

Webb, the world's largest and most powerful space science observatory, is designed to answer outstanding questions about the Universe. The telescope launched on an Ariane 5 from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana on 25 December 2021

The James Webb Space Telescope Phase E – Operations and Sustainment contract is a sole source cost-plus-fixed-fee contract with a value of $31,186,099. The contractor will be responsible for providing the products and services required to monitor and maintain Webb spacecraft systems including the spacecraft bus, optics/telescope, and sunshield; maintain and update the spacecraft flight software; and trend spacecraft performance and recommend corrections and updates required for spacecraft health and safety, NASA said in a statement on Friday.

We continue to help NASA operate the world's premier space science observatory and extend our knowledge of the cosmos. Learn more about our new multi-year contract from @NASAWebb for sustainment of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST): https://t.co/tqkrBcA2Iz pic.twitter.com/snLf6qfFx8

— Northrop Grumman (@NGCNews) December 16, 2022

The Webb mission is an international partnership between NASA, ESA and CSA. In July 2022, Webb's first full-color images and spectroscopic data were released, which officially marked the beginning of the telescope's general science operations. The premium space-based observatory will study every phase of the 13.5 billion years of cosmic history - from within our solar system to the most distant observable galaxies in the early universe and everything in between.